Today, the League of Women Voters, NAACP, and Equal Justice Society filed an amicus brief urging a federal court to invalidate a recent executive order issued by President Donald Trump seeking to revoke birthright citizenship for individuals born in the United States to undocumented persons or temporary legal residents.
Represented by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, this is the only amicus brief filed which explicitly centers racial justice. The filing emphasizes that birthright citizenship is not a matter of political debate or preference, but rather a right rooted in the purpose of the Reconstruction Amendments, which established and protects the full personhood and civil rights of Black Americans and other historically excluded communities.
The amicus brief also makes the case that the executive order would erode American democracy by diminishing the ability for Black Americans and other communities of color to meaningfully participate in democracy. The order would drastically reshape the electorate and reimpose a racial hierarchy previously abolished by the Reconstruction Amendments.
“The Fourteenth Amendment is unequivocal and clear: any person born in the United States is a US citizen,” said Celina Stewart, chief executive officer of the League of Women Voters of the United States. “This administration’s attempt to blatantly disregard the Constitution is deeply chilling, a direct attack on Black Americans, and fundamentally at odds with the promise of American democracy and personhood.”
“The Reconstruction Amendments were designed to ensure that Black and Brown people had the same rights and access as white people in this country. Together, they ensure that this nation would never re-live the horrors of slavery and the era of Dred Scott,” said Olivia Sedwick, counsel, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. “This executive order is not only unconstitutional, but it is deeply ahistorical and regressive. If it is allowed to stand, this nation can no longer hold itself out to be the bastion of freedom and democracy to the world.”
“This executive order is a direct assault on the Constitution and the fundamental rights it guarantees,” said Janette McCarthy Wallace, NAACP Chief General Counsel. By attempting to strip birthright citizenship from native-born Americans, it threatens to resurrect a shameful, exclusionary past and create a legally inferior underclass—disproportionately harming communities of color and silencing future generations in our democratic voting process. We cannot allow this dangerous erosion of our democracy to stand.”
“Birthright citizenship is foundational to ensuring Black Americans’ humanity, equality, and full place in our democracy,” says Mona Tawatao, Legal Director of the Equal Justice Society. “This is what the drafters of the Fourteenth Amendment intended; the executive order to revoke this sacred right should alarm everyone who cares about equal rights and equal protection under the law.”